There was some non-osprey-related excitement yesterday evening on the nature reserve, during the last osprey monitoring shift of the day. As we know there are often sightings of water voles in the channels in front of Waderscrape hide, well yesterday there was an otter!

Volunteer on duty Mick Lewin was over the moon, as otters are very elusive creatures and are only spotted on rare occasions. Mick said there were about 20 visitors in the hide at the time, and there was so much excitement, as you can imagine, that the hide was in a frenzy!

The otter did not stay long, just swam up one of the channels, then turned tail and retreated back down it again. Before it turned around, Mick managed to take some great photographs of it, shown below. Thanks to Mick for letting us share these!

What an amazing experience, to see an otter at such close quarters! They have been seen on the reserve in the past, but only on a handful of occasions, and nobody has managed to capture a picture before.